Last week, I went into the details of the NFP report (SeeTearing Apart January 2012 NFP data). There were 10 positive bullet points versus 5 negatives — and even those negatives were the same old sore spots (high teen and minority unemployment, persistent long term joblessness, etc.) that have been plaguing the labor market for some time now.

I mention these bonafides because I am no sycophant when it comes to BLS data. I have long urged a healthy skepticism, and have tried to look beneath the headlines (perhaps if there is interest, I may post a guide to various ways to read BLS employment data).

However, after Friday’s solid NFP release, some unusual — and to be blunt, quite silly — commentary was about the intertubes. Quite frankly, it embarrassed its authors, whom I would categorize into three distinct cliques: The PermaBears, the Political Knaves, and the Consistently Wrong (some people belong in more than one category).

Understand what this Census adjustment actually is: BLS takes the decennial census, and adjusts its estimates for total population, work force, and employed, and does so for a variety of demographic factors. No, it is not that the non-institutional population suddenly rose by 1.7 million month-over-month, and therefore the labor force suddenly lost a million people. Rather, this reflects a “frame of reference” revision incorporating the latest census data.

“I don’t want to overstate the significance of [Zero Hedge's] oversight, which conservative voices around the media and the web are also making, namely the idea that the participation rate dropped 0.3 percent and the labor force dropped more than 1.2 million in the past month. Those things are simply not true no matter how loudly people scream “conspiracy” and “propaganda.” (Having been trading financial markets for about 25 years, I’ve heard these same accusations about economic data being manipulated to help the incumbent president — whether Democrat or Republican — so many times, they just bore me now.)”

This error was immediately picked and amplified by CNBC’s Rick Santelli, who was one of the Tea Party’s founding fathers. Santelli has been dead wrong about NFP the past 6 months (or longer). From the floor of the Chicago Exchange, he has underestimated Employment data month after month without correction or remorse. I haven’t teased apart everyone of his calls, but it seems that he has been consistently on the wrong side of the data since the late Spring. Perhaps The Daily Show might like to take a look at his prognostication skills.

Lastly, there are those who have been simply wrong. I have to throw Charles Biderman under the bus here. He has been so consistently wrong over the past 4 years it has been rather astonishing. He utterly missed the signs of the crisis in 2007-08, denied the recession deep into it, and then missed the turn in 2009-10. (If there is interest, I might post his major calls).

Biderman actually complained that — WTF!?! — all of the gains were due to seasonal adjustments in January. This has to be one of the single most clueless economic statements I have ever read. Of course there are massive seasonal adjustments in January! There is a huge hiring surge in November and December — primarily retail sales and shipping — which is unwound in the New Year. This occurs annually, mostly due to a little-known holiday you might have heard of called Christmas.

Ignore the economic foolishness of the biased political hacks and perma-bears. If you want an excuse to be cautious on the markets, then look at the mixed earnings near a cyclical peak, the overbought condition of indices, and the headaches in Europe. There are always plenty of reasons to be concerned and worried — but the January NonFarm payrolls isn’t one of them.

2781912 Responseshttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.economonitor.com%2Fblog%2F2012%2F02%2Fa-few-thoughts-on-the-employment-situation%2FA+Few+Thoughts+on+the+Employment+Situation2012-02-06+22%3A19%3A55Barry+Ritholtzhttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.economonitor.com%2F%3Fp%3D278191 to “A Few Thoughts on the Employment Situation”

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Richard has published papers on wages policy, the taxation of financial arrangements and macroeconomic issues in Pacific island countries. Views expressed in these articles are his own and may not be shared by his employing agency. He is the author of How to Solve the European Economic Crisis: Challenging orthodoxy and creating new policy paradigms

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